News

To answer the question in the headline of this article, the short answer is: yes. Jim Parsons actually taught himself how to play the theremin for "The Big Bang Theory."

In the episode "The Bus Pants Utilization", the lead characters gather together to invent an app that lets users solve differential equations. Such an app, they figure, is specialized enough that no one else has published one yet, and they begin to have fantasies about potential wealth and fame. Sheldon, however, begins to fantasize that their roommate Penny (Kaley Cuoco) might be angling to steal their idea, even though she clearly wants nothing to do with it. Sheldon also becomes preoccupied with their team's command structure and who the leader might be. He becomes caty, cruel, and vindictive, making fun of his teammates to assert his leadership over them.

Sheldon is eventually, understandably, kicked off the team. As revenge, he...

Douglass Fake, founder of leading movie soundtrack label Intrada and producer of more than 700 albums of movie and TV music, died Saturday at a Richmond, Calif., hospital after a long illness. He was 72.

Fake’s many credits include the first complete restoration of Leonard Bernstein’s “On the Waterfront,” a lavish 5-cd release of Elmer Bernstein’s “The Ten Commandments” and the debut of several Henry Mancini scores including “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” previously only available in abridged pop recordings.

Among the label’s best sellers were expansions of previously incomplete recordings of such classics as John Williams’ “Jaws,” Alan Silvestri’s “Back to the Future” and Jerry Goldsmith’s “Alien.” Fake also supervised the re-recording of a dozen albums of classic film music including Bernard Herrmann’s “The Man Who Knew Too Much” and Miklos Rozsa’s “Ivanhoe,” “Spellbound” and “Julius Caesar.”

A longtime film-music fan, Fake launched Intrada Records...

A three-way tie exists for the most Oscar wins, held by Ben-Hur, Titanic, and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. The iconic films share an emphasis on high production value, great actors, and brilliant directors who brought home the Oscars. While Ben-Hur, Titanic, and Lotr may have 11 Oscars each, West Side Story (1961) holds close with an impressive 10 wins.

Every spring the Academy Awards showcase the most celebrated, prestigious films of the previous year, but which movie has the most Oscars under its belt? There are countless standouts that have been acknowledged and praised for their awards, and while the main focus tends to be on celebrities who win Best Actor/Actress or Director, the other categories shouldn't be overlooked. Across 23 categories, everything from sound to costumes to art direction — everything that goes into making a movie incredible — is rewarded.

Across its history, the number of Oscars categories has changed,...

On Nov. 29, 1945, Paramount Pictures and Billy Wilder brought their adaptation of The Lost Weekend to theaters in Los Angeles. The film would go on to be nominated for seven Oscars at the 18th Academy Awards, claiming four wins, including best picture. The Hollywood Reporter’s original review, headlined “Brackett, Wilder, Milland Do Great Jobs In ‘Weekend,'” is below:

This is undoubtedly the best horror picture of the year and it is without question one of the best pieces of picture-making, so far as writing, directing, acting and any other techniques are concerned, that Hollywood has turned out in many a long moon. The word-of-mouth advertising alone will prove to be as terrific as the picture is horrific.

Effective is a mild word for the picturization of this novel, taken from the book of the same name. With the exception of the end, it has stuck most faithfully to the original,...

Christophe Honoré selected Catherine Breillat’s 36 Fillette: “Her work is very important for French cinema.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Jacques Demy’s Lola (starring Anouk Aimée with Marc Michel), Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas, Zhangke Jia and composer Yoshihiro Hanno, Yves Robert’s La Guerre des Boutons, Alain Resnais’ Providence and L'Année Dernière à Marienbad, Kenneth Lonergan’s Manchester By The Sea, Sophie's Misfortunes, and Catherine Breillat’s 36 Fillette all came up in our discussion.

Christophe Honoré with Anne-Katrin Titze on why Alain Resnais is a king: “I’m interested in narrative play and people who have a ludic relationship to storytelling.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Christophe Honoré was in New York to present Winter Boy, starring Paul Kircher, Vincent Lacoste, Juliette Binoche, and Erwan Kepoa Falé, shot by Rémy Chevrin (Guermantes, [film]On...

If a single WW2 Hollywood war epic can sum up the complexity of homefront morale-building, this one is it. Claudette Colbert, Paulette Goddard and Veronica Lake enlist as Army nurses and are plunged into the disastrous opening onslaught in the Philippines. Adroit screenwriting and direction use the clichés of Hollywood glamour to give mom & dad back home a dramatic idea of what it might be like for a company of nurses in a failing war zone. Great studio effects show the rough retreats and casualties, while George Reeves and Sonny Tufts serve as reassuring sentimental diversions. And a squad of ‘unglamorous’ actresses get to play strong, patriotic roles. It’s an entertaining winner.

So Proudly We Hail

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1943 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 126 min. / Street Date September 13, 2022 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Claudette Colbert, Paulette Goddard, Veronica Lake, George Reeves, Barbara Britton, Walter Abel, Sonny Tufts, Mary Servoss,...

The third ‘Essential’ noir collection is easily [Imprint]’s best, with two genuine classics of the style plus two excellent and equally entertaining thrillers. The directors are first-rank: Lewis Milestone, Mitchell Leisen, William Dieterle and William Wyler. Top stars are present too: Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin, Lisabeth Scott, Kirk Douglas, William Holden, Alexis Smith, Edmond O’Brien, Humphrey Bogart, Fredric March. The high-quality suspense and jeopardy are uniquely noir: The Strange Love of Martha Ivers, No Man Of Her Own, The Turning Point and The Desperate Hours. [Imprint] taps bona fide experts for the xtras.

Essential Film Noir Collection 3

Blu-ray (Region-Free)

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers, No Man Of Her Own, The Turning Point, The Desperate Hours

Viavision [Imprint] 148, 149, 150, 151

1946 – 1955 / B&w / 1:37 Academy (3), 1:78 widescreen (1) / 411 min. / Street Date August 31, 2022 / Available from Viavision [Imprint] / au 139.95 , Amazon / 136.64

Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Van Heflin, Lisabeth Scott, Kirk Douglas; Barbara Stanwyck, John Lund, Lyle Bettger; William Holden, Alexis Smith,...

The Oscars don’t always get it right. There have been many notable injustices since the first ceremony took place in 1929, but surely none more surprising than the absence of Alfred Hitchcock’s name from the list of winners.

The man responsible for some of the greatest films ever made, and who committed many of cinema’s most deathless images to celluloid, never won an Academy Award despite being nominated for best director on five occasions: Rebecca in 1940, Lifeboat in 1944, Spellbound in 1945, Rear Window in 1954 and Psycho in 1960.

However, these five movies represent just a small percentage of Hitchcock’s magnificent oeuvre of 52 films. To counteract this injustice, here is my selection of his 20 greatest.

20. Blackmail (1929)

A young woman kills a man who tries to rape her and then finds herself caught between the investigating policeman, who happens to be her fiance, and a blackmailer. Generally considered to be the first British talkie,...

The Oscars don’t always get it right. There have been many notable injustices since the first ceremony took place in 1929, but surely none more surprising than the absence of Alfred Hitchcock’s name from the list of winners.

The man responsible for some of the greatest films ever made, and who committed many of cinema’s most deathless images to celluloid, never won an Academy Award despite being nominated for best director on five occasions: Rebecca in 1940, Lifeboat in 1944, Spellbound in 1945, Rear Window in 1954 and Psycho in 1960.

However, these five movies represent just a small percentage of Hitchcock’s magnificent oeuvre of 52 films. To counteract this injustice, here is my selection of his 20 greatest.

20. Blackmail (1929)

A young woman kills a man who tries to rape her and then finds herself caught between the investigating policeman, who happens to be her fiance, and a blackmailer. Generally considered to be the first British talkie,...

The Oscars don’t always get it right. There have been many notable injustices since the first ceremony took place in 1929, but surely none more surprising than the absence of Alfred Hitchcock’s name from the list of winners.

The man responsible for some of the greatest films ever made, and who committed many of cinema’s most deathless images to celluloid, never won an Academy Award despite being nominated for best director on five occasions: Rebecca in 1940, Lifeboat in 1944, Spellbound in 1945, Rear Window in 1954 and Psycho in 1960.

However, these five movies represent just a small percentage of Hitchcock’s magnificent oeuvre of 52 films. To counteract this injustice, here is my selection of his 20 greatest.

20. Blackmail (1929)

A young woman kills a man who tries to rape her and then finds herself caught between the investigating policeman, who happens to be her fiance, and a blackmailer. Generally considered to be the first British talkie,...

The origins of electronic music in cinema go back to the first half of the 20th century. This mix is a homage to some of those moments.It begins with a 1930s Pathé archive example of an early version of what would become a synthesizer, before moving into Dmitri Shostakovich’s first use of theremin on screen in the 1931’s Alone, directed by Grigori Kozintsev. Originally a silent film, Alone gained a soundtrack by Shostakovich just before release once film sound was made available in Russia. Bernard Herrmann’s iconic use of the theremin in The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) has a wonderful moment in this mix wherein we hear the studio sketches of this score’s creation. Taken from the 2018 reissue of the score, this recording presents studio outtakes and rehearsal moments during the production. Herrmann can be heard in the background prompting different actions from his orchestra.

Lovers of vintage English crime thrillers will have a lot to chew over with this pair of escapist gangster pix, one pre-war and one post-. In each an innocent young couple suffers a run-in with a criminal gang. John Mills and Richard Attenborough are the ‘fresh’ new talent on display. The leading lady of Dancing with Crime is Sheila Sim, playing opposite her husband Attenborough. The co-feature The Green Cockatoo sports credits for William Cameron Menzies and Miklós Rózsa.

Dancing with Crime + The Green Cockatoo

Blu-ray

Cohen Film Collection / Kino Lorber

1937 & 1947 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 82 + 64 min. / Street Date January 25, 2022 / Available from Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Richard Attenborough, Sheila Sim, Barry Jones; John Mills, René Ray, Robert Newton.

Original Music: Benjamin Frankel, Miklós Rózsa

Directed by John Paddy Carstairs; William Cameron Menzies

The Blu-ray era has given home video devotees great opportunities to catch up with ‘exotic’ genre films from abroad. American TV...

Maverick director Robert Aldrich’s one foray into grand-scale epic filmmaking is returned to crystal clarity in this fine import disc, a restoration from original Italian film elements. Stewart Granger’s Lot allies his Hebrew tribe with the notorious cities of evil, and almost loses his soul to Anouk Aimée’s wicked Queen Bera. Pier Angeli is the slave who becomes Lot’s wife, and Rossana Podestà is the daughter taken by Stanley Baker’s rapacious prince. Second unit director Sergio Leone whips up a terrific battle scene (maybe), Ken Adam provides the spectacular sets and Miklós Rózsa the powerful music score. And yes, the explosive finish involves hellfire, brimstone and the Biblical Pillar of Salt.

Sodom and Gomorrah

Explosive Media

All-region Blu-ray

1962 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 154 and 117 min. / Street Date December 9, 2021 / Available from Amazon.de /

Starring: Stewart Granger, Pier Angeli (Anna Maria Pierangeli), Anouk Aimée, Stanley Baker, Rossana Podestà, Rik Battaglia,...

The pandemic may have cancelled live performances and moviegoing for most of 2020, but for film-music buffs, that just meant more time at home listening to their favorite music, including many releases of music never before heard outside their original cinematic contexts.

“There is still an unquenchable thirst for classic scores, both previously unreleased and reissues of scores that are expanded, re-mastered, or both,” says Matt Verboys, co-owner of L.A. label LA-La Land Records. “As technology keeps advancing, many previous releases can now get a sonic upgrade that makes the music well worth a revisit.”

The business challenges remain unchanged, however, he says: “Who holds the rights to a given score and can those rights be obtained? Do the music elements even exist and if so, can they be rounded up? Once obtained, is the audio good enough to release, or does massive restoration work need to be done?”

Perennial favorite composers Bernard Herrmann,...

by Cláudio Alves

Alfred Hitchcock's third and final film for producer David O. Selznick was released 75 years ago. During a time when psychoanalysis was gaining popularity and notoriety, Hollywood was quick to cash in on the phenomenon. They created psychobabble Pablum like Spellbound and its view on dreams are both too literal and ephemeral. It's a message picture in the costume of a radical polemic, devoid of authentic psychic unrest even though Selznick brought his own therapist to act as an advisor. All in all, it's rather mediocre with some blindingly bright highlights...

For starters, this was Hitch's first collaboration with Ingrid Bergman, a partnership that would bear majestic fruit one year later with Notorious. She's not nearly as good in Spellbound, but there's an interesting tension between her and a profoundly miscast Gregory Peck. The two even had an affair on the set of the movie. Then, we...

Fathom Events, Turner Classic Movies and Warner Bros. are bringing one of the most visually spectacular motion-picture epics of all time back to the big screen: Ben-hur, which celebrates its 60th anniversary with this two-day-only presentation. This is a must-see if you’ve never seen it in the theaters – especially for the heart-pounding chariot race.

Sunday, April 14, 2019 – 1:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. (local time)

Wednesday, April 17, 2019 – 1:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. (local time)

Director William Wyler’s classic received 11 Academy Awards, more than any other film to that point (and still tied with Titanic and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King).

The production encompassed 300 sets, nine sound stages and consumed 1.1 million feet of film, yet never loses sight of its compelling story of Jewish prince (Charlton Heston) who vows revenge when he is enslaved by his Roman childhood friend (Stephen Boyd). Jack Hawkins,...

One of the best Hollywood historical epics takes Technicolor to Mexico for a Production Code version of La conquista: the Inquisition is still bad, but the Church is exonerated. Likewise with the invasion — Cesar Romero embodies a marvelous Hernán Cortés, substantially less murderous than the one we now know from accurate history books. Tyrone Power is the heartthrob hero and newcomer Jean Peters the lowborn girl who loves him. The magnificent scenery is matched by the music score of Alfred Newman.

Captain from Castile

Blu-ray

Twilight Time

1947 / Color / 137 Academy / 141 min. / Street Date October 17, 2017 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store / 29.95

Starring: Tyrone Power, Jean Peters, Cesar Romero, Lee J. Cobb, John Sutton, Antonio Moreno, Thomas Gomez, Alan Mowbray, Barbara Lawrence, George Zucco, Roy Roberts, Marc Lawrence, Reed Hadley, Robert Karnes, Estela Inda, Chris-Pin Martin, Jay Silverheels, Gilberto González.

Cinematography: Arthur Arling, Charles G. Clarke, Joseph Lashelle

Film Editor: Barbara McLean...

A few weeks ago, Daily Dead had the opportunity to speak with director Steve Mitchell about his new documentary, King Cohen, which profiles maverick filmmaker Larry Cohen and his wild journey throughout his decades-spanning career (you can read that interview Here). And now that this writer finally had the opportunity to see King Cohen as part of the 2017 Fantastic Fest lineup, I had a few more questions for Mitchell, who managed to craft an entertaining, informative, and heartfelt celebration of a truly one-of-a-kind talent in Cohen.

Great to catch up with you again, Steve. You did a great job with this project, and I loved how it balanced out all these things I’ve enjoyed about Larry’s career so far, and also dove into a lot of things I had no idea about. Is there an art to balancing out the stuff that fans are going to expect versus...

Golden Globe and Emmy nominee Benjamin Wallfisch is recognized as one of the leading film composers of his generation, with a career spanning over a decade and 60 feature films. He has composed music for such legendary film makers as Steven Spielberg, Rupert Wyatt, Gore Verbinksi and Lars von Trier, and has worked on scores that have been recognized with awards and nominations at the Academy Awards, BAFTAs and World Soundtrack Awards.

Wallfisch fit us into his extremely busy schedule and we were happy to have any time with this dynamic composer. We asked him about Verbinski’s thriller A Cure For Wellness and the sensational Hidden Figures — both now on Blu-ray/VOD — as well as insight into how he works.

The Film Stage: I first heard your name when your music was featured on a friend’s film score radio show: Tim Burden’s Movie Magic. In short, “Conquest 1453” just blew me away.

This remake of a pre-Code classic adds amazing European locations, glorious Technicolor and entire armies on the move, yet doesn’t improve on the original. Producer David O. Selznick secured Rock Hudson to play opposite Jennifer Jones, but the chemistry is lacking. Why did the man spend twenty years trying to top Gone With the Wind?

A Farewell to Arms

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 152 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Jennifer Jones, Rock Hudson, Vittorio De Sica, Mercedes McCambridge, Elaine Stritch.

Cinematography: Oswald Morris, Piero Portalupi

Production Designer: Alfred Junge

Art Direction: Mario Garbuglia

Film Editors: John M. Foley, Gerard J. Wilson

Original Music: Mario Nascimbene

Written by Ben Hecht from a play by Laurence Stallings from a novel by Ernest Hemingway

Produced by David O. Selznick

Directed by Charles Vidor

What happens when a major Hollywood producer thinks he has all the answers?...

Martin Scorsese, Edgar Wright, Kevin Smith among those to pay tribute to director.

Following the news that American director Jonathan Demme has died at the age of 73, the film industry has taken to social media to mourn the loss.

Martin Scorsese issued a statement that read: “Whenever I ran into Jonathan, he was filled with enthusiasm and excitement about a new project. He took so much joy in moviemaking. His pictures have an inner lyricism that just lifts them off the ground – even a story like The Silence Of The Lambs.

“I have great admiration for Jonathan as a filmmaker – I love the freshness of his style and his excellent use of music, from Buddy Holly to Miklos Rozsa. There’s so much more to be said, and I hardly know where to begin. I also loved him as a friend, and to me he was always young. My young friend. The idea that...

On this day in history as it relates to showbiz!

1907 Composer Miklós Rózsa born in Budapest. He becomes an Academy favorite in the early 40s and is nominated 17 times for his music with 3 Oscar wins (Spellbound, A Double Life, Ben-Hur)

1922 Emmy winner Barbara Hale (Perry Mason) born in Illinois

⇱ 1946 Hayley Mills born in London. She becomes the very last winner of the special "juvenile Oscar winner" for Pollyanna (1960) and chases it with the classic twin comedy The Parent Trap (1961). Did you know she was Tfe's favorite classic child star? Now you do.

1947 James Woods born in Vernal, Utah

1953 Rick Moranis born in Toronto. Today's movie fans probably don't know this but in '89 he starred in 3 consecutive $100 million grossers in one single summer (Ghostbusters II, Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Parenthood) and it was a very big deal because back then the same people weren't in every movie. Tfe's theory...

John Huston’s primal heist film is an almost perfect movie, with a score of unforgettable characterizations. A solid crime noir, it concerns itself with the human ironies in the ‘left handed form of human endeavor.’

The Asphalt Jungle

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 847

1950 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 112 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date December 13, 2016 /

Starring Sterling Hayden, Sam Jaffe, Louis Calhern, James Whitmore, Jean Hagen, John McIntire, Marc Lawrence, Barry Kelley, Anthony Caruso, Marilyn Monroe, Brad Dexter.

Cinematography Harold Rosson

Art Direction Randall Duell, Cedric Gibbons

Film Editor George Boemler

Original Music Miklos Rosza

Written by Ben Maddow and John Huston from the novel by W.R. Burnett

Produced by Arthur Hornblow, Jr.

Directed by John Huston

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Talk about a film that becomes only more enjoyable with each viewing… John Huston’s The Asphalt Jungle is the Singin’ in the Rain of noir masterpieces.

Marlon Brando put his all into this impassioned, expertly acted and crafted VistaVision western spectacle. Has it been overlooked because of the scarcity of quality presentations? Karl Malden, Katy Jurado, Pina Pellicer, Ben Johnson and Slim Pickens are unforgettable, as are the Big Sur locations. One-Eyed Jacks Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 844 1961 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 141 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date November 22, 2016 / 39.95 Starring Marlon Brando, Karl Malden, Katy Jurado, Ben Johnson, Slim Pickens, Pina Pellicer, Larry Duran, Sam Gilman, Míriam Colón, Timothy Carey, Margarita Cordova, Elisha Cook Jr., Rodolfo Acosta, Joan Petrone, Joe Dominguez, Tom Webb, Ray Teal, John Dierkes, Philip Ahn, Hank Worden, Clem Harvey, William Forrest, Mina Martinez. Cinematography Charles Lang. Jr. Film Editor Archie Marshek Original Music Hugo Friedhofer Written by Guy Trosper, Calder Willingham from the novel The Authentic Death of Hendry Jones by Charles Neider Produced by Frank P. Rosenberg Directed by Marlon Brando...

Nicholas Meyer's first directing effort is a classy science fiction thriller best remembered for a charming romantic angle, and for introducing many of us to the marvelous Mary Steenburgen. Clever storytelling pits Malcolm McDowell against fellow time tripper David Warner, in a fourth-dimensional pursuit of none other than Jack the Ripper. Time After Time Blu-ray Warner Archive Collection 1979 / Color / 2:40 widescreen / 112 min. / Street Date November 15, 2016 / available through the WBshop / 21.99 Starring Malcolm McDowell, David Warner, Mary Steenburgen, Charles Cioffi, Kent Williams, Andonia Katsaros, Patti D'Arbanville, Corey Feldman, Shelley Hack, Clete Roberts. Cinematography Paul Lohman Film Editor Donn Cambern Original Music Miklos Rozsa Written by Nicholas Meyer story by Karl Alexander & Steve Hayes Produced by Herb Jaffe Directed by Nicholas Meyer

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Known for his smart scripts -- face it, even Invasion of the Bee Girls is an intelligent script -- Nicholas Meyer broke into the writer-director hyphenate...

The chase is on: a mix of icy ruthlessness and warm romanticism enliven Ken Follett's novel of pre-invasion esponage intrigue. Kate Nelligan heats up the screen with Donald Sutherland, the 'seventies most unlikely sex star. Plus a lush and wondrous music score by Miklos Rozsa. Eye of the Needle Blu-ray Twilight Time 1981 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 112 min. / Street Date September 13, 2016 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store29.95 Starring Donald Sutherland, Kate Nelligan, Christopher Cazenove, Ian Bannen, Philip Martin Brown, Bill Nighy, Stephen MacKenna, Sam Kydd. Cinematography Alan Hume Original Music Miklos Rozsa Written by Stanley Mann based on the novel by Ken Follett Produced by Stephen Friedman Directed by Richard Marquand

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

We're all familiar with this kind of thriller -- over shots of fresh-faced troops moving off to war, a portentous scrolling text tells us about the desperate situation of London -- and the Free World -- as Hitler's Luftwaffe threatens.

Almost six decades ago, Charlton Heston embodied Ben-Hur, a prince falsely accused of treason by his adopted brother, in the Academy Award-winning blockbuster of the same name. Winning 11 Oscars, including Best Picture, this drama became a classic in cinema history. Now, the epic story of Judah Ben-Hur returns to the big screen in Timur Bekmambetov’ remake. As the helmer takes audiences back to the chariot races, it seems like critics aren’t up for the ride.

IndieWire’s David Ehrlich calls the film “chariots of misfire” and states that “Jesus dies for our cinema sins in this biblical epic.” He also notes that “if each new “Ben-Hur” is a reflection of the time in which it was made, this one may remember 2016 time as a grim time for blockbuster entertainment.”

Read More: ‘Ben-Hur’ Review: Jesus Dies For Our Cinema Sins In This Redeemably Garish Biblical Epic

Owen Gleiberman of Variety...

Jack Huston plays Judah Ben-Hur and Morgan Freeman plays Ilderim in Ben-Hur from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and Paramount Pictures.

Check out the trailer, along with the first poster, for the timeless epic, Ben Hur, based on the best-selling novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of Christ.

Paramount Pictures’ newest version of the timeless classic is one of the most-anticipated movies of 2016.

Will be interesting to see how this film compares to the 1959 classic, directed by William Wyler, produced by Sam Zimbalist for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and starring Charlton Heston, Stephen Boyd, Jack Hawkins, Hugh Griffith and Haya Harareet. The nine-minute chariot race has become one of cinema’s most famous sequences, and the film score, composed and conducted by Miklós Rózsa, is the longest ever composed for a film and was highly influential on cinema for more than 15 years.

The 2016 version’s score is from composer Marco Beltrami.

Ben-hur is the epic story of...

It’s easy to take the music of Star Wars for granted. After all, that would mean no iconic opening fanfare. There would be no disco remixes nor any “Cantina Band” for future filmmakers to quote from. College marching bands would have to find something other than “The Imperial March” to tease the away team with, and Nick Winters would never treat his lounge audience to his timeless cover. A reality without Star Wars music would find a different soundtrack sitting atop AFI‘s greatest film scores.

Fortunately, John Williams’s original Star Wars score did happen, and in 1977 it was a big deal. Disco and R&B owned the pop music charts. For science-fiction and fantasy cinema — genres whose idealism had diminished in the wake of the Vietnam War and Watergate –soundscapes were defined by synthetic music that separated viewers from their fantastical worlds onscreen. Context is essential to...

Criterion digitally restores this earlier release, a combination offering of Robert Siodmak’s 1946 film noir masterpiece The Killers paired with Don Siegel’s retro 1964 remake. Famed adaptations of Ernest Hemingway’s short story, both filmmakers take liberties with the original material to create aggressively different products. Siodmak’s version is not only the German ex-pat’s enduring masterpiece, it’s a definite cornerstone of classic American film noir. Though Siegel’s 60s rehash is considered tacky pastiche of the era, it’s brutal, hard boiled B-grade pulp, notable for its own significant instances.

Siodmak’s version arrived during a golden era of noir, premiering a year after WWII officially ended, with cinematic masculine representation on the eve of an overhaul as method acting would soon reign supreme. Hemingway’s spare story gets a face life from Anthony Veiller (The Stranger; Night of the Iguana), using the murder as a jumping...

Ben-hur is returning to the big screen!

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and Paramount Pictures announced today that principal photography has begun on Ben-hur starring Jack Huston (“American Hustle”) as Judah Ben-Hur, Morgan Freeman (“The Shawshank Redemption”) as Ilderim, Toby Kebbell (“Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes”) as Messala and Nazanin Boniadi (“Homeland”) as Esther.

Directed by Timur Bekmambetov (“Wanted”) and written by Keith Clarke (“The Way Back”) and John Ridley (“12 Years A Slave”), the film is based on Lew Wallace’s epic novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of The Christ.

The epic 1959 film was directed by William Wyler and starred Charlton Heston, Jack Hawkins, Stephen Boyd, Haya Harareet, Sam Jaffe and Hugh Griffith. It won 11 Oscars including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor. The magnificent score is by composer Miklós Rózsa.

Watch the trailer Here.

The producers are Sean Daniel (“The Mummy” franchise), Mark Burnett (“Son Of God”), Joni Levin (“The Way Back...

During the editing (which is when I really start to see the film), I saw that it was Hitchcock who had guided us through the writing and Lang who guided us through the shooting: especially his last films, the ones where he leads the spectator in one direction before he pushes them in another completely different direction, in a very brutal, abrupt way.

—Jacques Rivette on his Secret défense (1998), fro http://www.jacques-rivette.com/

Long before the much-vaunted, high-concept ‘mind-game movies’ like Memento (2000), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) or Inception (2010), there was Fritz Lang’s Secret Beyond the Door… (1947). The film is like a broken puzzle at every level, virtually begging us to rearrange its pieces and find its key. Indeed, one almost needs to formulate a ‘hypothesis of the stolen film,’ Ruiz-style, since the movie we have before us is not quite the one Lang and his talented writer Silvia Richards (Possessed,...

Complex and avant-garde French film director best known for Night and Fog and Last Year in Marienbad

Alain Resnais, who has died aged 91, was a director of elegance and distinction who, despite generally working from the screenplays of other writers, established an auteurist reputation. His films were singular, instantly recognisable by their style as well as through recurring themes and preoccupations. Primary concerns were war, sexual relationships and the more abstract notions of memory and time. His characters were invariably adult (children were excluded as having no detailed past) middle-class professionals. His style was complex, notably in the editing and often – though not always – dominated by tracking shots and multilayered sound.

He surrounded himself with actors, musicians and writers of enormous talent and the result was a somewhat elitist body of work with little concern for realism or the socially or intellectually deprived. Even overtly political works, Night and Fog,...

David McCallum with event host Bruce Crawford. (Photo: Steve Gray)

By Jon Heitland

On any list of the best films based on World War II, The Great Escape, directed by John Sturges and based on the novel by Paul Brickhill, will always rank near the top. The compelling story of a group of British and American prisoners of war and how they outwitted their Nazi captors observes its 50th anniversary this year, and actor David McCallum, who plays Ashley-Pitt in the film, travelled to Omaha, Nebraska on November 9, 2013, to help celebrate the classic film. Proceeds went to the Nebraska Kidney Foundation, which was why McCallum took time from his busy television schedule to make an appearance. The evening event centered around a showing of the film at the large, concert-style theater at the prestigious Joslyn Museum, to an enthusiastic, full house crowd of 1000.

The Great Escape 50 year retrospective was another...

Sergio Leone Week! continues at Trailers from Hell, with director Brian Trenchard-Smith introducing "The Last Days of Sodom and Gomorrah." Leone was an (uncredited) second unit director on this epic potboiler directed by Robert Aldrich, whose own appetite for lurid scenarios is on full display (it was released the same year as Whatever Happened To Baby Jane). This was the last of the great Miklos Rozsa’s truly magisterial scores (he replaced Dimitri Tiomkin and considered the resulting film “tacky”). The production design was by Ken Adam (who was working on Dr. No the same year). Currently unavailable in DVD in the Us.

Blu-ray Release Date: Dec. 10, 2013

Price: Blu-ray $Tba

Studio: Twilight Time

A scimitar-wielding Kali makes her move in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.

Twilight Time honoring the inimitable stop-motion animation special effects of the late Ray Harryhausen with the first time Blu-ray release of a pair of Harryhausen-infused family-friendly Sinbad adventure films from the 1970s, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973) and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977).

In The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, Harryhausen gives us another installment in the adventures of the swashbuckling sailor Sinbad (John Phillip Law), who is pitted against a nefarious master of the black arts (Tom Baker, TV’s Doctor Who) as the two race to find a magical treasure trove. Over the course of the film, Sinbad confronts a host of astonishing Harryhausen creatures, including a wee-winged homunculus, a one-eyed centaur, and the six-armed, scimitar-wielding deity Kali. Directed by Gordon Hessler, the film co-stars...

The Lost Weekend

Directed by Billy Wilder

Written by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder

1945, USA

Billy Wilder’s films are perfection. From Double Indemnity to Some Like It Hot, Wilder never made a bad film. And while his earlier films are some of my absolute favorites, I had always skipped over The Lost Weekend. Put it down to my skepticism of casting handsome romantic leading man Ray Milland in such a grim role and the sheer weight of the subject matter.

Milland is Don Birnam, a struggling writer who hasn’t written anything since first coming to New York and having magazines immediately reject his work. He tries to write but never seems to be able to finish his stories. Instead, he spends his time and money finishing bottles of liquor. For the past six years, Birnam has battled his writer’s block with alcohol. An inexplicably patient and loyal girlfriend,...

Above: A rack focus in Bullitt.

Trespassers Will Be Eaten

Perhaps a less eye-grabbing, but still “driving” title for this third Mubi soundtrack mix should be Shifting Gears...as such, it’s a free-falling, propulsive survey of scores focusing on the thriller in all of its manifestations: detective procedurals, bank heists, neo-noirs, spy films, psychodramas, giallos, chases, races, and sci-fi mind-games. Featured also are a few composers better known for their more famous musical projects. Police drummer Stewart Copeland’s metallic, rhythmic score for Rumble Fish, gamely taunts the self-conscious black and white street theatre of Francis Ford Coppola's film. So-called fifth Beatle, producer George Martin’s funky Shaft-influenced Live and Let Die score ushers in a more leisurely 70s-era James Bond, as incarnated by Roger Moore. Epic crooner visionary Scott Walker’s fatally romantic melodies for Leos Carax’s inventively faithful Melville adaptation Pola X is remarkably subdued and lush.

This past Sunday night, I hiked my way up to one of the best things about living in Los Angeles — the Hollywood Bowl — for a concert celebrating the 100th anniversary of Paramount Pictures. The Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, led by conductor (and film composer) David Newman (Ice Age, Serenity), played symphonic selections from 15 Paramount features for a chronological journey through movie music history, including a 10-minute battle scene from 1927′s silent Wwi aerial combat film Wings (the first movie to win the Oscar for Best Picture), the bell tower sequence from the Alfred Hitchcock classic Vertigo, the classic conductor scene from...

Blu-ray & DVD Release Date: Sept. 4, 2012

Price: DVD $24.95 each, Blu-ray $29.95 each

Studio: Olive Films

Olivia De Havilland doesn't like what she sees in The Dark Mirror.

The Dark Mirror (1946) and Secret Beyond the Door (1947), two classic film noir crime movies, make their DVD and Blu-ray debuts from Olive Films.

The Dark Mirror finds Olivia De Havilland ( Gone with the Wind) portraying twin sisters who are implicated in a Hollywood murder, while a police detective (Thomas Mitchell) must figure out if one or both were involved in the killing. As a psychiatrist approached by the detective to help with the complicated case, Lew Ayres agrees to see them separately and he’s immediately attracted to one of them and fears the other one to be killer. But he’s also worried that if he’s wrong he could end up on a slab in the morgue himself.

The movie features taut direction...

The classic, quintessential film noir, which set the standard for all future noirs, Double Indemnity is to be released in the UK as part of Eureka’s Masters Of Cinema Series on Blu-ray (Standard and SteelBook editions) on 25 June 2012.

We have three copies of the Blu-ray to give away!

“That’s a honey of an anklet you’re wearing, Mrs. Dietrichson.”

Double Indemnity is the dazzling, quintessential film noir whose enormous popular success and seven Oscar nominations catapulted Billy Wilder (Some Like It Hot, Sunset Boulevard, The Apartment) into the very top tier of Hollywood’s writer-directors. Adapted from a novella by James M. Cain (The Postman Always Rings Twice), co-written by Wilder and Raymond Chandler (The Big Sleep, The Long Goodbye), Double Indemnity remains the hardest-boiled of delectations.

Insurance hawker Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) gets seduced by some other man’s wife: a bored, sex-starved Barbara Stanwyck done up...

Spellbound is the second Alfred Hitchcock film we are looking at this week. MGM has released three of the director’s acclaimed films on Blu-ray. Spellbound is a slight departure from 1941′s Rebecca - the previous film we just looked at – even though they share many similarities as well. Aside from existing as early examples of the talented director’s career, both films focus on an out of the ordinary relationship between two seemingly normal individuals. In both cases you deal with characters whose mental state is being torn apart due to memories of their past. It’s an interesting comparison though I feel Spellbound explores this idea in more intriguing ways. Obviously in much more direct ways as well. Hitchcock’s foray into psychoanalysis is a complex film that needs to really be studied to fully appreciate its intricacies. Join me as we take a look into its mind.

"I want to thank three persons,” said Michel Hazanavicius, accepting the 2012 Best Picture Oscar for “The Artist.” “I want to thank Billy Wilder, I want to thank Billy Wilder and I want to thank Billy Wilder.” He wasn’t the first director to namecheck Wilder in an acceptance speech. In 1994, Fernando Trueba, accepting the Foreign Language Film Oscar for "Belle Epoque" quipped, "I would like to believe in God in order to thank him. But I just believe in Billy Wilder... so, thank you Mr. Wilder." Wilder reportedly called the next day "Fernando? It's God."

So just what exactly was it that inspired these men to expend some of the most valuable seconds of speechifying airtime they'll ever know, to tip their hats to Wilder? And can we bottle it?

Born in a region of Austria/Hungary that is now part of Poland, Wilder's story feels like an archetype of...

Every writer has his or her way of settling down to write. Mine is to bring a Diet Pepsi and a pack of Salem cigarettes – yeah, yeah, I know… my bad – to my computer desk. Oh, yeah, and slipping in a CD.

Here’s the dope.

I’m pretty much out of the loop when it comes to music.

On the radio I listen to our local NPR (I love everything about that station); the local CBS sports station (especially during the football season – and during the past two or three weeks, the Peyton Manning-Tim Tebow-Mark Sanchez drama here in New York City has mesmerized me); Wrl-1600 Am (the progressive station that took over for Air America here); occasionally Wwor-710 Am (though the station has moved too far to the right for my tastes – at least they got rid of Lou Dobbs!); and CBS’s “oldies” station when I’m commuting.

Alfred Hitchcock is today best known for his work in the 1950s and 1960s, thanks to Universal and Warner Bros. steady stream of restored re-releases on Blu-ray but recently, 20th Century Home Entertainment reminded us that the master director wasn’t exactly idle in the years before. A trio of his 1940s works – Notorious, Spellbound, and Rebecca – are now out on Blu-ray for the first time and it begs a fresh look at his black and white thrillers.

Hitchcock began his stormy relationship with MGM producer David O. Selznick with 1940’s Rebecca, a psychological drama which is noteworthy as the director’s first American film. Adapted from Daphne du Maurier’s bestseller, it featured Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, and Judith Anderson. Being a gothic tale of loss, while gently questioning whether or not Olivier killed his first wife, it was a good fit for Hitchcock, introducing him to the American...

Chicago – I’ve long said that one of the main reasons that Blu-ray didn’t take off as quickly as people thought it would is because too many of movie lover’s favorite movies weren’t available on the format. It took years to get “Alien,” “Star Wars,” and even “Back to the Future.” “Jaws” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark” still aren’t in HD. Well, a wave of catalog releases last week that included some of my personal favorite films ever made should help the format overall. With several Oscar winners and some of the most influential filmmaking of all time, this is an amazing catalog wave. Buy all six.

Blu-ray Rating: 4.5/5.0

Where to start? How about a competition as to which of these films is the most influential — “Rebecca,” “Annie Hall,” or “The Apartment”? All three amazing works of art just hit Blu-ray for the first time,...

DVD Playhouse—November 2011

By Allen Gardner

Tree Of Life (20th Century Fox) Terrence Malick’s latest effort is both the best film of 2011 and the finest work of his (arguably) mixed, but often masterly canon. A series of vignettes, mostly set in 1950s Texas, capture the memory of a man (Sean Penn) in present-day New York who looks back on his life, and his parents’ (Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain) troubled marriage, when word of his younger brother’s suicide reaches him. Almost indescribable beyond that, except to say no other film in history so perfectly evokes the magic and mystery of the human memory, which both crystalizes (and sometimes idealizes) the past. Like Stanley Kubrick’s 2001, this is a challenging, polarizing work that you must let wash over you. If you go along for the ride, you’re in for a unique, rewarding cinematic experience. Also available on Blu-ray disc.

(Fritz Lang, 1947, Exposure, PG)

Fritz Lang, whose German expressionist movies helped create film noir, saw his disciple Alfred Hitchcock surge ahead of him in Hollywood. With this psychoanalytical thriller incorporating elements of Rebecca, Suspicion and Spellbound, he sought to establish he was Hitch's equal. It proved a critical and commercial disaster but is now widely seen as a key example of Lang's "fantastical realism". A sublime, delirious melodrama, it stars Joan Bennett as a sleepwalking heiress who meets a charming architect (Michael Redgrave) in Mexico, and marries in haste. He turns out to have a bizarre family past and a weird present that includes re-creating in the basement of his New England mansion the rooms where famous murders occurred. Redgrave was cast because of his schizophrenic ventriloquist in Dead of Night. The outstanding photography is by Stanley Cortez, who shot The Magnificent Ambersons and The Night of the Hunter. The...

Chicago – It may not even be Halloween yet, but Warner Brothers is in full holiday gift set mode, hoping that one of their lavish packages will make its way on to your wish list. Will it be the glorious seventh anniversary edition of “Citizen Kane”? Or perhaps the upcoming gift set of “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory” with collectibles and a 144-page booklet? For many, the choice will be simple — a film with an iconic actor that set records at the 1959 Oscars as any in history — “Ben-Hur,” strikingly transferred in 1080p and available in a Limited Edition box set that will look fantastic on any hardcore movie fan’s shelf.

DVD Rating: 5.0/5.0

We were lucky enough to get our hands on the Ultimate Collector’s Edition of “Ben-Hur” and while some of these WB holiday releases often feel perfunctory (another release for “Christmas Vacation”?), this one seems perfectly in line...

It was set for a 50th Anniversary release back in 2009, only to be delayed due to the sheer extent of restoration work done to upgrade this classic film. Read on to discover whether the wait for the ultimate edition of Ben-Hur was really worth it!

Produced in an era that bore a number of epic Biblical tales, Ben-Hur is possibly one of the most celebrated of a bunch of films that reflect this time period within Hollywood. Made by MGM in 1959 for $15 million (a staggering amount of money for the time and one that meant the film was the most expensive the studio had ever produced), Ben-Hur is an ostentatious symbol of all that is great about Tinsel Town and the sheen and glamour it churns out. However, the film is also a lot more than a simple big-budget Hollywood romp of excess and high-polish: at the heart of the...